cumulo-, cumul-, cumuli-

1. To collect or to obtain a large amount of something over a period of time.
2. To gather or to pile up; to amass.
3. Etymology: When, in colloquial speech, a man refers to the accumulating of a fortune as "making his pile", he is using exactly the same figurative language as that which first suggested the word accumulate.

Cumulus is Latin for "a heap" or "pile", and cumulare means "to pile up:. With the prefix ad, "to", we have accumulare, "to heap together", which is the source of our English word accumulate.

1. A process by which something increases in amount or is collected together over time: When a person continues to put money into a bank account, the amount that builds up is the accumulation of his or her savings.

If a person has an interest-bearing account, the interest will make the accumulation even larger.

2. Several things that are grouped together or which are considered as a whole.
3. The act of gathering or amassing, as into a heap or a pile: The accumulation of leaves blocked the drain pipe from the roof of the house.

Clouds that are formed of rounded in fleecy white or gray masses: The altocumuli of cloud elements usually are sharply outlined, but they may become partly fibrous or diffuse and they may or may not be merged together at an intermediate altitude of about 2,400 to 6,000 meters (8,000 to 20,000 feet).

1. Any increase in the concentration of a chemical in a biological organism over time, compared to the chemical's concentration in a surrounding area.
2. An increase in the concentration of a pollutant from external conditions to the first organism in a food chain: The accumulation of chemicals by organisms present in the environment, most often are expressed as the ratio of the concentration of a chemical in the organism to that in the medium, usually water.
3. The increasing concentration of a compound, usually applied to fat soluble pesticides; such as, DDT, in the bodies of living organisms at successively higher levels in the food chain.

Plant or animal species that brings together heavy metals or other environmental contaminants in its tissues, and can be used as an indicator of the presence of chronic pollution by these compounds; especially, where the amounts of pollutants are too low to be easily detectable.

1. To burden or to weigh down: Janice was cumbered with many more duties during the summer because so many of her co-workers were on vacation.cumbered with a painful back after he slipped on the wet floor and fell down.
3. To litter or to clutter up: After so much rain and warm weather, weeds have been cumbering the path ways in the city park.

1. Descriptive of being hard to handle or to manage because of size or weight: The mailman had to deliver a cumbersome package to Jake's house, which was almost too big to carry though the front door!
2. Referring to something that is complicated and hard to do: Jane had to fill out a cumbersome application for a job which was very time consuming and hard to understand.
3. Relating to any thing that is long and difficult to read or to say: Harriet's expanded job title is really a cumbersome one to remember and even to use when talking about it.
4. Something that is awkward or difficult to carry, to move, to manipulate, to deal with, or to handle because it is heavy, large, or clumsy: It is said that the medieval suit of armor, while cumbersome, was an effective protective body covering during battles.

Jake and James struggled to move Jane's cumbersome piano to a different room.